Social Media Sensation & Neuroscientist Dr. Tara Swart at Godmothers Books
Hellos loves! Here is a cosmic literary nod in my Society column just for you. I attended the first public appearance of global social media sensation Dr. Tara Swart, at Godmothers, Monday, August 18. Four days prior, she openly discussed her private life reveal and new book, The Signs: The New Science of How to Trust Your Instincts, with Steven Bartlett on his Diary of a CEO podcast in Los Angeles. Swart is a PhD neuroscientist and Oxford University trained medical doctor, leadership coach, author, and podcast host.
After learning that Swart was coming to our town from L.A., I texted my dear friend and massive supporter of the arts, Ashley Woods Hollister, who isone of the founding members of Godmothers. She booked us tickets, and added to our group Lani Reagan, CEO at Dynamic Healing Therapies, and certified Intuitive Life Coach. Also attending were Montecito Union School Foundation fund supporter Sally Morgan with her friend Reid Ryan, owner of Polymorph Beauty.
I arrived at Godmothers pre-show for my scheduled interview with its co-owner Jennifer Rudolph Walsh,who was theExecutive Vice President and Co-Head of the William Morris Agency’s Worldwide Literary Department for 25 years.Walsh and I met upstairs at the bookstore, where she introduced me to Swart who was preparing for her talk. As I had my Dirtea travel mug with me #ifyouknowyouknow, Swart exclaimed, “You know about Dirtea in the U.S.?! I am their Chief Science Officer. Have you tried the gummies yet?!” – we bonded over mushroom x health.
After a photo session with Walsh, I asked her about curating the bookstore’s collection and the speaker series. With Walsh’s CV reading like a NY Times best seller itself, she explained, “It’s an alchemical process, we know a Godmothers book when we hear it. We are not really looking for a specific thing. When we hear about a book that feels like it will resonate with our guests, we jump at it. It can be anything from a book about bee pollination to a book about intuition; science, culture, memoir, and authentic story telling is always what draws our guests in. There is a whole grid process for how books come into our radar.”
Next, I asked Walsh if there is a book she would like to write. She said, “Not really. I edited a book called Hungry Hearts, but really you know I think that my work is the thousands of books that are here, and how I curate a little piece of myself in all of them. So there really isn’t a specific book that is unwritten inside me right now.” She promised to let me know if she decides to write a book – stay tuned! It was then time for Swart’s talk on the Godmothers’ stage.
Swart was introduced and interviewed by Riley Blanks Reed for approximately 45 minutes to a sold-out audience, followed by a Q&A.
Through the interview, Swart recapped how her book, The Signs, came about and where she hoped it would help others. This book follows her first book, The Source (2019), where she outlined links between how the brain works with the laws of attraction and manifesting one’s life path. As an example, Swart discussed how she used the process of manifestation and action (vision) boarding to attract her husband, Robin, in 2016, as well as her career change from psychiatric medicine to self-development/career coaching.
The Signs book is a tribute to Robin after his passing in 2020. It covers the processes she went through to move from grief to healing, including signs from him. The signs she received after his death included an abundance of robins in her backyard and waking to an image of her husband in front of her after being physically “thumped on her shoulder at 4 am.”
She went on to present that, as a scientist/doctor, there are known facts now that at one time we did not hold to be true or possible. Like a driverless car, for instance. She mentioned this to illustrate that discussions about the nature of consciousness may seem similarly speculative at this moment but may not always be. For example, she touched on the same topics in her talk with Bartlett, where she stated, “…confirmation bias is dependent on the reticular activating system, which is the system of your brain that filters out what’s not crucial to your survival and filters in what it wants you to notice. And so actually, one of the things I’ve written about in the book is the art of noticing. Because really, we live in this world where life is passing you by at 100 miles per hour. You’re not noticing things that could actually be crucial to you thriving, rather than your just surviving in this model called ‘shared trait vulnerability,’ which falls under the field of research called neuro aesthetics. If grief is like psychosis and I’m currently in a very vulnerable state, is creativity a conduit for me to get not only back to the state that I was in before, but into a state of expanded awareness where I can loosen the filter as I see fit? I can notice things that I would have passed by before, and I can think differently about how my mind works, how the world works, and possibly what happens after someone passes away.”
At first blush it looks like yet another self-help book. Swart comes in different. With her medical background on the line, she said she had to back it up with science, be open to new evidence, and that areas not yet scientifically proven are, conversely, not disproven.
I couldn’t help but wonder if her research is “scientific enough” to convince board-certified psychiatrists to add it to their patient diagnostics and treatment. Imagine a world where medical students learn how to harness consciousness and intuition as part of prescriptive healing modalities. Would they advise reading books by consciousness-power of the mind gurus like Shakti Gawain, Louise Hay, Neville Goddard, Joseph Murphyauthor of The Power of Your Subconscious Mind,and Dr. Maxwell Maltz, a plastic surgeon who authored Psycho-Cybernetics in 1960, using visualization and mental rehearsals to improve one’s self-image and lead a more fulfilling life? As our town’s globally-respected consultant, psychic, medium, author and aura expert Pam Oslie, said in her TEDx talk, “The real question is, are we evolving in our understanding and knowledge of who we really are and the nature of reality? Consciousness is non-local. Remember, a lot of science fiction is now science fact.” Adds Bob Proctor, “Change is inevitable, but personal growth is a choice. The only limits in our life are those we impose on ourselves.”
After the talk, Swart stayed on at length to personally sign copies of her book and take selfies with attendees, so generous with her time she was almost late for her dinner at Lucky’s Montecito.
She signed my book by drawing a mushroom next to her signature, and as I left I pondered the rom-com, Serendipity, which is about noticing signs and taking action on those opportunities. The movie’s female lead is Sara from England, a psychiatrist living in NYC/San Francisco who, after a one-time instant-attraction interaction with a man named Jonathan while shopping, decides to test their fated meeting, while he goes on his gut feeling.
No spoilers on how the movie proceeds. Let’s just say, like Swart’s book The Signs, you’re just going to have to experience it to find out and create your own reality.
You might also be interested in...
You must be logged in to post a comment.